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Yasukuni Shrine, located in Tokyo, Japan, is dedicated to over 2,466,000 Japanese soldiers and servicemen who died fighting on behalf of the Emperor of Japan in the last 150 years. It also houses one of the few Japanese war museums dedicated to World War II.The shrine is at the center of an international controversy by honoring war criminals convicted by a post World War II court including 14 'Class A' war criminals. Japanese politicians, including prime ministers and cabinet members have paid visits to Yasukuni Shrine in recent years which caused criticism and protests from China, Korea, and Taiwan.

Liu Jieyi, China's permanent representative to the United Nations, speaks during a Security Council open debate at the UN headquarters in New York. Photo: Xinhua

China and Japan accused each other of threatening stability on Wednesday as a diplomatic battle over Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s visit to a contested war shrine reached the UN Security Council.

China’s UN ambassador, Liu Jieyi, seized upon a debate on the lessons of conflict to slam Abe for going to the Yasukuni Shrine, which honours war criminals among the country’s war dead.

Attempts to change history “destabilise regional peace and pose a serious challenge to the peaceful course of mankind,” Liu said.

South Korea also condemned Abe’s December 26 visit to the shrine that honours 2.5 million war dead, including 14 war criminals from the second world war.

But Japan rebuffed the attacks.

“Japan does not believe that such actions are helpful in lowering tensions and enhancing the stability in the region,” said the country’s deputy UN ambassador, Kazuyoshi Umemoto.

Other countries see Yasukuni as a symbol of Japan’s refusal to come to terms with its wartime past. But Japan is also involved in a tense territorial dispute with China over islands in the East China Sea.

China has repeatedly condemned Abe for the shrine visit while tensions over the islands have mounted.

Abe “paid hommage to those who launched a war of aggression and were up to their elbows in the blood of the people in the countries they invaded,” said the Chinese envoy.

“Abe’s hommage to those fascist war criminals is nothing less than a challenge to the victorious outcome of the war against fascism.”

“Abe is trying to reverse the verdict on the war and defend war criminals,” he added.

South Korea’s UN ambassador, Ah Joon, highlighted the plight of Korean “comfort women” forced to act as sex slaves for Japanese troops in the war.

“Tensions are escalating more than ever before due to the distrust among states in Northeast Asia,” Ah told the council debate.

“And this mainly stems from the fact that the Japanese leadership has a distorted view of what happened during the time of imperialism.”

He said Japanese leaders had “shown an attitude of historical revisionism” by going to Yasukuni and making “irresponsible” remarks over the militarist past.

“If Japan seriously wishes to contribute to regional and global peace, it should refrain from provoking its neighbours with its denial of history,” the South Korean envoy said.

Japan’s prime minister has denied paying any tribute to the war criminals and has in turn criticised what he calls China’s increasing military assertiveness.

Japanese envoy Umemoto rejected the diplomatic assault, insisting his country “squarely facing these historical facts, has expressed its feelings of remorse and heartfelt apology” for its wartime actions.

“Japan’s position is that this issue should not be politicised or be turned into a diplomatic issue,” he said. Japan, he added, wants “a future-oriented and co-operative relationship” with China and South Korea.

Japan has seen repeated calls for a summit with its neighbours rejected by Beijing and Seoul.

Japan is a country steep in the evil war-mongering tradition based on the false Shinto religion which at one time had the Emperor of Japan as a God only to be relegated into something not divine when Japan surrendered unconditionally after her inglorious military defeat in WWII which put an end to the most barbaric episode in Asian history which the fascist Japanese leaders like Shinzo Abe continuously deny. Japan is an uncivilised country and should be kicked out of the UN.

You are such a fool to make that kinds of comments. Two wrongs do not make a right. What Japanese did to the whole Asia was devastating. When I was small boy in HK, I listened to my mom and grandmom how they were always so hungry during the Japanese occupation that they ate everything they could get, grass, dirt, etc. In the 5000 years history, Han people has forced the minorities to the mountains so that they can occupy the rich land at the plain. But so did the White who killed most of the Indians and slave the Blacks in America in the past 200 years. That is human nature. Not that we agree to what our ancestors did, we just need to admit our mistakes and realize that now we are more civilized and not to kill other people and get their lands. You just need to take your head out of your **** and listen to what those Japanese politicians said nowadays. They damn well are saying that if they have the opportunity, they will do it again. They even compare themselves a few times to the Germany right before the WWII. If we do not put a stop to it when we can, then we will face the disaster just the European faced. The European took a passive role and allowed the Nazi to grow strong, and even tolerated them when the Nazi started to show their aggressiveness. The end result was Nazi grew more stronger and the end result was WWII.